Ex-Walmart employee awarded $1.4 million for mistreatment by manager

A jury on Wednesday awarded a former Walmart assistant manager $1.46 million — more than she had requested — for six months of mistreatment she suffered at the hands of a Windsor store manager three years ago.

A Walmart lawyer, meanwhile, called the award “perverse” and said outside court that he believes it will be overturned on appeal.

Meredith Boucher, 42, successfully argued that she was subject to profane and insulting mental abuse from May to November 2009 from Jason Pinnock, 32, then the manager of the east-side Walmart store, including being called “a (expletive) idiot” and being made to count skids in front of others to prove she could count.

“We’re delighted for Ms. Boucher,” her lawyer Myron Shulgan said after the verdict was announced. “She championed the cause for workers and indicated that corporations will be made to respond to improper treatment of employees.”

Shulgan argued his client was subject to sexual harassment and discrimination, intentional infliction of mental suffering, and — at the hands of an assistant manager who punched her in the arm two days in a row and was subsequently fired — assault.

The jury of three men and three women, who decided that Boucher was constructively dismissed — in other words, forced out through abusive treatment — awarded her: from Walmart, $200,000 for intentional infliction of mental suffering, $1 million for punitive damages, and $10,000 for assault; and from Pinnock, $100,000 for intentional infliction of mental suffering, and $150,000 for punitive damages. She received nothing for alleged sexual harassment and discrimination.

Boucher’s statement of claim asked for $200,000 for intentional infliction of mental suffering and $1 million in punitive damages, so Shulgan will attend court again Thursday on a technical matter: increasing the amount requested so that its jibes with the amount awarded.

“I’m happy. I feel like I have been validated,” Boucher said. “When the foreperson read the first question, ‘Was Meredith Boucher constructively dismissed?’ And they said, ‘Yes,’ I don’t know what happened after that.”

Boucher shed some tears of relief and joy following what she called a “horrendous” experience that cost her her health and a job. She has been out of work since leaving Walmart in November 2009 but said she’s feeling better and invigorated to restart the career that originally had her fast-tracked for promotion until Pinnock turned against her.

Her suit against the largest retailer in the world did not come without risk. If she had lost, the unemployed married mother of one grown daughter may have had to pay Walmart’s court costs, which easily could have reached the tens of thousands.

“I value truth and integrity,” she said, noting that she felt obliged to stand up against bullying at the workplace. “It was just about making sure people knew that this happened and something needed to be done about it.

“I lost my career. I lost a lot of friends over it because I didn’t feel that I should speak with them since I didn’t want to put them in jeopardy.”

Walmart lawyer Stephen Jovanovic said outside court that while he is glad the jury did not agree Boucher was subject to any sexual harassment or discrimination, he considers the award wildly out of whack.

“The award of a million dollars is perverse, in my opinion, based on precedents for wrongful dismissal damages,” said Jovanonic, who did not have a chance immediately after the decision to speak with Pinnock but did talk with a Walmart representative. “I recommended that it be appealed.”

Jovanovic said the jury, which deliberated for less than two hours after a 2 1/2-week trial, did not appear to consider the complex issues sufficiently.

He said Superior Court Justice Renee Pomerance gave complex instructions to the jury for longer than they deliberated. He also noted that Pomerance instructed the jury not to consider a figure Shulgan brought up in his closing address, when the plaintiff’s lawyer recalled that a witness estimated Boucher would have earned$1.3 million had she continued working at the company till 65.

Jovanovic said a wrongful dismissal award of this magnitude would bankrupt all but the largest corporations.

“I don’t think it will set a precedent,” he said, “because I expect it to get set aside on appeal.”